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Get inspired by three women as they share unHidden Conversations. Coach and speaker Gina Hatzis speaks about her viral video on what it means to be too much woman. She explores how women, too often, are told to be small in this world -pushing down the common narrative that we are not enough. Mary Lou Sandler of 3 Cubed Studios talks about the concept of self-care after trauma. Coming from personal experience, she shares the six years of diving deep into past trauma and healing from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse. Coach Tory Dube finishes it off by talking about dating someone based on their potential. She explores relationships and how you can move towards a relationship that does not make the other feel small.

We’ll be doing three clips from three unHidden Conversations. The first one is this amazing woman named Gina Hatzis who I met through a friend, Lucia. She has been in the business for twenty years. She’s a coach, she’s a speaker and then she did this unspoken word act and it was picked up and Goalcast picked it up and went totally viral. At this point, she’s at twelve million thirteen million views about what it means to be too much woman. She’s so much fun to be on the show. This is my first unHidden Conversation, I had a total blast. Without further ado, here is my unHidden conversation with Gina Hatzis. Gina is a friend recommended who has done some incredible work in the last twenty years of business where her video went viral with ten million views. Can you tell a story of how you got here and how it happened?

Thanks for having me, Robert. The story is quite simple. I’ve been a speaker both publicly, professionally, corporately for twenty years talking about communication, empowerment and intuition. It’s been a reflection of my journey. Whatever I’m interested in, I start to research for myself and then I share it with as many people who will listen. About six months ago, I was invited to speak in a local competition in Toronto, Canada. I’ve never done a speaking competition in my life. Speaking is my craft. It’s what I do for a living and for some reason I said yes. Looking back, it was divine timing but for some reason, I said yes. I thought, “I don’t know these people. I don’t know anyone in the room.” I thought it’s going to be 30 people at a pub. I decided instead of talking about what I always talk about I would try something new and tell something very raw and honest.

I told the story of my struggle as a too much woman. It was cool, I won the contest. A lot of people on Facebook saw the video. I thought it went viral with 20,000 views overnight. I was like, “That was cool.” Then something crazy happened and it started to get a lot of attention and Goalcast, an online media platform picked it up and it’s got two million in three weeks. Here’s the interesting part. I’ve been telling stories my whole life, I finally told something I thought no one would understand. I was scared to tell the story. If you would have told me to write a speech, it’s going to go viral and ten million people are going to watch it, I never would have told the story in this way. What I’m learning is that when we tell the truth and we’re vulnerable, amazing things can happen. It shifted the whole trajectory of my work and my life in the past couple of weeks.

I’m listening to you and I don’t know if people reflect this back to you but you feel so powerful and soft in the same moments. It’s like I feel myself drawn in and there’s almost like an internal massage going in at the same time. That is a good trick. Exceptional. Too much woman, does not every woman believe that? Is this not a common theme?

Here’s the interesting thing. I work with women all the time and there’s a common narrative and I don’t mean to speak on behalf of all women. I don’t pretend to know all women or even men but there’s a common narrative that I hear that we are not enough and we bought into this mythology that we are not enough, we don’t show up enough, we’re scared, we have all this fear. While I also have that, my experience has been that I’ve always felt I’ve had to dim what I call my too-muchness. There have been messages throughout my life and my speech just picked on a couple of them but I’m too intense, too emotional, too driven, too sensual, too sensitive, too smart and there were repercussions to that. I’ve had to dim them over my life. I remember about a couple of years ago, I was blogging for a while. I started to write a blog about this experience and I felt it seemed so pathetic. People struggle with some real shit. The poor little girl, “I’m so sorry that you’re too much.” The story of my struggle has been about the repercussions of being too much and all of that and having to do dim and what I’m learning is that’s what we all do. I just never saw it that way because I’ve always heard the not enough story. The same coin, different side. If you’re not enough, if you’re too confident, you’re not humble enough. It’s the same thing, it’s just a different way of looking at it.

My friend, my bestie and my colleague, Ken Blackman, produced this chart for his book, Powerful Woman Confident Man. He said when men’s confidence goes up, so does the attractiveness. When women’s confidence goes up, there’s a point and then their attractiveness drops. It is an awful trap of rise, rise, rise and then he did six charts like that. It’s a brilliant little annoying thing. My point is I get it. I know this complaint from women for men is like I’m afraid too much it’ll be less attractive because of men’s egos and fears. Is that true with what your experience of that?

It’s true but I don’t want to demonize men. That’s a mistake that I often hear. It’s not the men versus the women per se. Although I’ve experienced that and I hear a lot of women say, “A lot of men can’t handle me,” or “They’re intimidated by me.” This is true. That has been my experience as well. It’s like, “Tone it down.” I remember in Eight Grade, I was sent to a gifted school and my teacher said to me, “Listen to me, no guy will ever like a girl who is too smart.” That kind of messaging dim it all down. This has been an awakening for me, that there are also repercussions amongst women for being too much. I stand for a paradigm shift where women are celebrating other women. We’ve been pitted against one another as well. If a woman is too vivacious, too sensual, too confident, I was a beat up in high school. It’s part of my speech because I just felt so good in my skin. I was a dancer. I just felt good and confident and who feels good and confident in your skin in the 9th grade? There were repercussions to that. It shows up in relationships with men. It shows up in relationships with other women. It shows up in the corporate world. It shows up in so many ways. It’s pervasive, so yes to your question is the short answer but it goes beyond that.

I’m hearing from men, gay men, trans. I’m hearing from all kinds of people saying they identify with that and I thought “Shit, here I thought this was just about me. I’m realizing it’s about other women and now I’m hearing that it’s so many of us have had to dim.”

My experience growing up was I had a big desire for food. I grew up in the ‘70s and ‘80s, it was a time of bad food. It was Wonder Bread and Ring Ding. There was no word gluten, the word gluten did not exist. I love food, I loved eating and then it freaked my mom out because she was worried about what does it mean that her son loves food so much. What she did was shrink me, push me down, try to contain me and that’s messed me up my entire life because now guess what it is when I look at my desire for attention, women, power, it’s connected way back to the food. What is it about the world that needs us to be so small?

First of all, you’re speaking my truth. I’m half Greek, half Italian. Food is love, it’s celebration, it’s how we mourn, it’s everything. The theme of the competition was body beautiful. A lot of the speech is about the body but too much woman is about the energy. Your question is what is it about the society that makes us one of them? What I’m learning in this space getting all of this global attention is how uncomfortable people are with it. On the one hand, you have a lot of people jumping out saying, “Remember me? I want to hook up.” Then there’s a whole bunch of people who are uncomfortable with what’s going on in their life. It is interesting because what happens when someone else shines? What is it about somebody else shining that makes some of us uncomfortable, that we can’t celebrate them and also shine? I’m curious, I don’t know the answer but it’s a cool social experiment that I’m undergoing right now.

I have a theory for you. I’m a geek, a nerd when it comes down to it. I was a computer programmer. One is the concept of the zero-sum game? Internment zero-sum is defined as if there are 100 marbles in the bowl, if I take 46 of them there’s only 54 left. That’s the zero-sum game. Whatever I take is less left for you. The second is the concept of Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse’s book. The concept is finite games are what we’re used to, win or lose, boundaries and rules. Infinite games are one where the goal just to continue to play. I’m a strong believer in non-zero sum games and infinite games. Games where if I can help someone get better even to win the prize, like announcing my buddy Ken Blackman so he can be successful. That has me feeling like a winner because he’ll be happier, I’ll be happier. I’m so thrilled to have you on the show because if I can help you, then you can help me, then our lives get better and that we can impact more people so there’s more beauty in relations. Most people are like, “You’re stealing my marbles.”

What is it that has to shift to take place? I find it so fascinating that there are some people that naturally can hold space for someone else’s celebration. I’m curious about that. I want to cultivate that and I’m starting with the women in my group. I have two large groups and I love to see women celebrating other women. It makes me emotional because I went to an all-girls Catholic school. It was brutal. Women will tell you, it’s the other women that are the hardest on us. What’s politically going on, the #MeToo and the Kavanaugh, all of that has given us a reason to band together. That’s a very big blanket statement but I’ve also seen it pulling us apart. There’s work to be done but I’m fascinated by all of it. I’m excited, I’m hopeful.

To me, it’s abundance versus scarcity. Society teaches you that there is a limited amount of resources, abundance says there’s enough to go around. When I was younger and chasing after the popular girls and they were not paying attention to me because I was nerdy and overweight, I felt in competition. I felt less than the other boys. I felt the loss of it and it took me to investigate through my own personal self -development, my own self-love and self-empowerment. The attention from women is the gravy. It’s the ice cream to the pineapple pie crumble but the apple pie is cooked the way it is. We don’t believe there’s enough. We’re fighting.

You make a good point. What I’m learning is that the work begins with me because there’s no question that when people are successful and I see people doing things that I know that I can do. I’ve been writing my book for two years and I see someone finish the book, the reflection is, “This is about me. I own that. I own that what it is about me that feels that about not finishing my book.” You nailed it, the work does begin with me looking at what is it about me that feels inept or not enough. That’s where the work begins for me. We own that, it’s a start.

Thank you so much for this conversation.

Thank you. I’m so excited to read your book.

I don’t know about you, but I was totally blown away by this unHidden conversation and truly amazing. What an amazing person to stand up. Find her, track her, watch her work. She’s truly an amazing human being in terms of this conversation about women and needs to come out. Thank you.

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The second unHidden conversation is with a totally different flavor. This was one of my favorites. It’s with a colleague, friend of mine, Mary Lou Sandler, 3 Cubed Studios. She has an amazing past of who she is. The show gets tender and sweet because we talk about the concept of self-care after trauma. Her husband, Justin, was diagnosed with cancer. He went through that process. She’s had sexual abuse in her past. I don’t know what it was, but we just went right to soft and tender. I know you’re used to the driving hard Rob Kandell. This one is a totally different flavor and one of my favorites. Without further ado, here’s Mary Lou.

Thank you for having me.

It’s my absolute pleasure. Lay it down. What’s your first thought about how to take care of yourself after you’ve done such extensive work of healing your trauma?

I went through the last years of diving deep into past trauma and healing from sexual, emotional and physical abuse and learned some interesting things. I used to be hardcore, “Don’t show your feelings,” kind of woman. I learned that when I broke down all those walls and started healing and bringing up past stuff, I became vulnerable. It felt like I was a little kid that’s susceptible. It’s like all these different emotions and things again. Some of it good, some of it not so good. Some of it traumatizing in itself. I’m now learning, even after years of trying to do a daily self-care regimen and why I can’t stick to it and see where that’s coming from.

unHidden Conversations: The narrative of not being enough and being too much are both the same things looked at from different angles.

What I’m hearing and please correct me if I’m wrong, but it feels like the trauma was a scaffolding holding of your system. It was integrated as part of who you were. When you removed it, I imagine your body not having the same scaffolding and being soft in places you’ve never felt before.

I’m learning a whole new level of intimacy with my family, my friends, my husband. It doesn’t happen fast but it’s like I open the floodgates and I can feel things I haven’t felt before.

I’ve done a bunch of trauma work on myself. I had a form of PTSD from some of the experiences I put myself into. I know there are still times when I’m interacting with Morgan or another person and they don’t know what they’re doing but they do something that triggers my trauma, that initiates that fight or flight or freeze inside of me. I don’t always know what to do in terms of taking care of myself because every situation is unique. What are your ways to take care of yourself? What have you discovered around yourself care?

I watched your video the other day of owning your no and I’ve been doing a lot of that lately. Even my yeses, being intuitive of how my body reacts and what I want to bring, stepping into myself and checking in. I used to do a lot of codependence, doing it to make other people feel better or so that they would like me, to not cause friction because I’ve had a lot of friction in my life, I didn’t want to cause more. It was stepping into myself and saying, “I’m feeling cheery right now.” I have to ask myself, “Is this something that they’re doing or is it coming from me?” It was trying to speak up before I react which has been challenging but what I’m doing pretty good. I slip sometimes as we all do, we’re all human. Justin is a very patient man.

What I’m hearing is twofold. One is patience. I love that we brought that word into the conversation because we have to be patient first and foremost with ourselves. I’ve read a lot of studies and talked to a lot of people about that concept. When you’re in a relationship with an alcoholic and that person gets sober, then there’s a reorientation. There’s a relearning of the couple in terms of, “I don’t know what you’re like sober, I don’t know what it’s like. I’ve always known you as someone who had alcohol as part of our systems.” As you’re talking, I imagine, and I have this in myself as well too, is trauma is like a colleague. It was something I lived with. It was something I’ve always known. I don’t want to say I miss it, but it was familiar and re-orientating myself to myself. The people who I love as I moved through my trauma, I met Morgan right at the beginning of my trauma recovery, maybe four, five months in. Then still continued progress after three and a half years. It is a reorientation of yourself and then your loved ones.

Justin and I have been together for ten years. I’ve only been on my journey about six. He’s seen half and half, the reactive Mary and then the Mary that’s learning how to communicate and not being so reactive. That’s very interesting. In the beginning, I remember saying and I said this to him or my family because I saw them and they kept bringing up the past Mary. I was feeling like that’s not fair and unfair for my own development if you’re not letting me progress. I was thinking about that with everybody. If you keep talking about how people used to be and reacting on how people are used to be, it’s not fair for anybody’s growth.

How do you feel being called past Mary? That sounds demeaning on some level.

It’s not all about being demeaning to me. It felt like I’ve been doing all this work and still your old friends or your family if you haven’t seen in a while will expect you to react the certain way and when you don’t, it’s very shocking. It did hurt. It’s like, “You haven’t seen all the stuff I’ve been doing.”

I just wonder if they were traumatized interacting with your trauma. Trauma spreads.

It does both ways. I wasn’t always so bright and cheery. I was very combative when I was little, protecting myself.

Is there some part of you that’s harder to love, that’s traumatized? Is there a part in present time that feels hard to love? When you think of things you’ve done or the person you’ve been, is it hard to be in a relationship with that memory?

I still have that relationship with that memory myself. There’s this ingrained thing where I always feel like other, like I don’t fit in. Even when people give me compliments or say, “I love you,” I’m like, “You do? Why?” There’s that ingrained thing I’m working on getting over or integrating it into this new person that I’m striving to be. It’s not a new person. I don’t have the words for it right now. I’m getting lost in my thoughts.

What my reflection is you moved out of your cortex into your emotions. It was a beautiful thing to watch and a tender thing to watch.

Thank you. I’m still working on things like being vulnerable in public. For some reason, I thought it wasn’t okay. You’re seen as weak. It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve cried on Robert Kandell’s interview.

Someone knows they have PTSD. They’ve been diagnosed or they are at the beginning of their journey. They’re just sensing or maybe they sense it or maybe they’ve read something or watch something and they know they’ve got to do the work. They’re scared to death of what they’ll see or who they’ll be or how much it cost or what not to give up. If you could talk to that person, would you give them any advice? What would you say to them?

I heard all those things too. I heard the, “I don’t have money to go to a therapist.” Most of the stuff that I’ve been doing for the last six years, I’m lucky enough to live in LA where there is a time but you. There is the coaching thing, LA Mother. I went and it was free. There’s always a coach somewhere doing some kind of seminar. There’s also Twelve-Steps groups and all kinds of things you can go to for free. There are so many resources no matter where you live. There are community centers that do all kinds of stuff. There’s even stuff I’ve seen next door where the neighborhood will get together into a meeting or something on some kind of emotional level. You just have to go out and do it and start. I hosted my first Women’s Circle and one of the women said that they always think of me as brave. I was like, “Brave? I’m terrified right now.” I go, “Somebody told me the meaning of brave is to be scared and do it anyway.” That was lovely to hear. That’s what I’ve always been doing. Even when I was in my trauma, I was always like, “I’m going to go run away and I’m going to do this.” I always beat it. I was scared but I did anyway. My scariest work hasn’t been surviving on the street. It’s been going deep in there and here and but it’s also been my most fulfilling work. I’m learning the deep level of intimacy. I’ve never learned before, I’ve never experienced before and it’s beautiful. It’s when you get to the deep core of human nature. That we are connected, while we’re going through something.

It’s such a different conversation than the ones we’re having. All of them have been beautiful on many different levels. I don’t know how society recognizes the impact of trauma. I can’t speak for women but for boys and men, it’s about, “No pain, no gain. Tough it out. You don’t have time to bleed.” All these messages were given that we don’t have time to confront the parts that are hurt. Trauma doesn’t have to be major. Trauma can be small, minute moments in time when your mom made a face or your dad raised a hand or there was anger between them that you felt and didn’t understand as a child.

unHidden Conversations: Society teaches you that there is a limited amount of resources; abundance says there’s enough to go around.

You witness something or there are so many different things.

Some schoolmate didn’t touch you appropriately or you didn’t validate your own feelings and so I wonder if we could qualify that pretty much as everyone has some sense of trauma. Some more than others. I don’t think there’s a lot of space in our society to truly say, “I need to have space to explore this.” You’re blessed with Justin who can say, “I’m with you.” I’ve witnessed him say it, “I’m with you on this journey.” To be by your side, that’s remarkable. I used to talk to him through his cancer and that was amazing. It was about a year. We do it for each other. There’s a book or a film that you’re working around this?

The CaregivingCancer.org. We’re doing a documentary on the caregiver. You don’t hear about that much and resources for you and the person that you’re caring for, for good self-care and to make sure all that’s what supposed to talk about is not pushed down your feelings. Feel your feelings, be in your feelings, be all up in your feelings. If you push it down, that comes out in some kind of physical way later or anger later. We’re always like, “Suck it up.” There’s the other movie, intimacy. I want you to be in it. It’s all about what your book is about. Male emotion.

It’s the permission to feel it all. Fell the same thing. That’s where the true trauma comes from. It’s not so much the moment in time. It’s your response to it or your lack of response to it or your lack of freedom around it. That’s what needs to be confronted.

The most of self-care they can do is love yourself and be more patient with yourself. Give yourself a break.

Thanks for talking with me.

Thank you. I always have a good time talking to you Robert.

Do you want to talk about your film studio? What do you do for people?

I hit some bumps along the way but it’s looking pretty good. You can find that at RobertKandell.com/book is my Indiegogo or RobertKandell.com. Also, podcasts and other videos can be found there, so check it out.

Always good nugget, every show. Tuff Love.

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Did you feel that in your heart? Listening again to it, I felt deep in my heart. The third clip is Tory Dube. I met Tory through my podcast agent. She has her own podcast. She’s a coach and she came to my communication course and it’s like you meet someone and you’re like, “We’re going to be friends with the rest of our lives.” That was the feeling I had from doing the podcast. Podcast get intimate very quickly and my one with Tory was like that and it hasn’t stopped in the three or four months. We’ve known each other and this one is about dating someone based on their potential which I thought was a great topic. She said, “I’ve never talked about this and never heard anyone talking about this,” so we jived for ten or fifteen minutes and it’s amazing. I got to meet her partner Patrick in my communication course which was super fun. Check out my unHidden Conversation with Tory. I’m very happy to introduce you to one of my new favorite people in the world, Tory. The concept of dating someone based on their potential. I’m not even sure what that means.

I chose this conversation because I haven’t heard people have this conversation. I get asked this all of the time. I work with a lot of women. They’re sitting in their curiosity. They’re seekers, they’re trying to find more peace and more happiness and it doesn’t mean that their partner always wants to do that. Very rarely that two people grow together. I thought that we could have an inspired conversation. I don’t necessarily have the answer. I have some ideas. I love to also hear your point of view because you’ve been with a lot of men.

You’re right. I don’t think people think in terms of, “I’m dating based on their potential.” People are always dating based on their potential or what they see or the sight. Maybe there is a disconnect of awareness of what you’re referring to.

I know that I hear often they’re like, “He’s such a good person. If only he could blank.” How do we bridge the gap of the blank?

I know women like men who are fixture uppers. That is a cultural enjoyment and men like to be the white knight to the broken-winged bird. These dynamics do happen and sometimes they go well, most of the time it’s not so pretty.

In that equation that you just presented, we’re both trying to fix the other person. Which we already know right away just in the basic relationship mechanics that that doesn’t work.

One cannot fix another. Only one can fix themselves. One could provide a great container and environment for the other to up-level their lives. Why don’t you play the woman and I’ll play the man since you’re a woman and I’m a man? We could switch roles, but you get the point. Why do you think women like men who are fixture uppers?

unHidden Conversations: If you keep talking about how people used to be and reacting on how people are used to be, it’s not fair for anybody’s growth.

I feel like it’s less intimidating in the beginning. There some source of whether it’s false or whether it’s real, this confidence of feeling like, “I’ve got the upper hand here. I see clearly, they don’t see clearly.” That’s where it starts. It’s a lot less intimidating to be intimate with somebody that isn’t pushing you out of your comfort zone. Then instead of working on the intimacy which is available when two people show up in a big way, now that’s when the big work starts. Now we can always use this distraction of, “I’m doing my work but he’s not doing his. I can keep the relationship communication going by telling him all the things he’s not doing right.” That takes up the space of the communications out of deep intimacy.

That is awfully true. One of the things I write about is that when your partner starts to expand, then it’s a warning to you. It’s a communication to you. You got to get off your ass and expand or expand them away and abandon your ass. Though we like it on some level consciously when our partner stays small.

In that, we like it when our partner stays small if we’re staying small. If we think we’re growing, suddenly the discrepancy becomes quite painful to feel like. What do we do when our partner is resisting the growth?

We have so many different bubbles to this conversation. I’m like jumping from thing to thing, but I can’t help it. What happens is that we manipulate our partners to stay small and that expands. This is all a lot of the conversation. We have a communication course around sexuality and desire. It’s like, “I’m going to keep this in a little box because then you keep your desire in a little box,” and we don’t expand and become the people we want to become.

This is a conversation I’ve been having a lot. It filters into this nicely. It’s this idea that we believe that we want clarity and comfort. I call bullshit. We are evolutionary beings. We want to be standing right on the precipice of our curiosity, of our growth and therefore what we’re seeking is the feedback. If we can’t show up in that relationship boldly like in our curiosity on the precipice of our growth, we can’t get any feedback.

Do you think people want that orthey want to believe they want that or they believe they’re doing that? Do you think when it comes down to people truly want to be standing on that chasm?

I do. I can only speak through who I am. I know the second I feel like I’ve got everything under control, I’m like, “This is boring. Time to add something.” Had I lead a different life maybe I could be fooled into thinking that I love comfort, but based on my specific trajectory, I had to figure out this thing, have some conversations with it and now I hear it’s always saying, “What could you do to be more creative? What could you do to play bigger? Our relationship is our biggest feature.” That’s where we play, that’s where we learn. It’s so easy to be an enlightened Buddha alone but the second we introduce other people, all of a sudden that’s where the growth happens.

Morgan, my wife, always says, “If you have a moment of free time, you’re creating something new.” It is totally my dynamic. The classic is like Christmas vacation. She spent her time with her mom and the kids. I left my own devices and I create a forecast package. Women do it because they don’t want to feel intimidated. Men do it I believe because that’s where they get value for themselves. Men are production junkies. We get our attractiveness based on our ability to produce. From that, if we’re helping the little lady to become a better person then we feel pride in the production of it. Now, there is an optimized clean version of that and then there’s also toxic because I was a white knight for a long time. My old mentor said, “You could walk into a room and your sense, you could find the broken-winged bird in the room.” I was like I had a magnet. I could fix a problem. I set appointments of my own problem.

Where it gets confusing is this big spiritual idea that we’re Ram Dass, we’re all waking one another home. We all are healers because if we can see the perfection somebody else and invite them into that, instead of shaming them, punishing them into their growth. Where do we draw the line when it’s an intimate relationship? How much do we see them for the perfection of their being without the brokenness, without the trauma, without the crap, to invite them into that? How much do we just say, “The discrepancy between where the wavelengths that were existing on air is too big right now?”

In your last communication, I heard an or. I live in the and. I hold the potential and I also have a sense of reality. Morgan, I go through this a lot because I see a significantly bigger potential for her than her own vision can see it for herself. I can hold that beauty of who she is without being annoying, like a bad football dad like, “Faster, more push up. Get down there, more work.” I have to find that balance of holding it and paying attention to what she wants because I can have my own intentions override her desires and that’s not a healthy place to be. That is the white knight piece.

I have a question then. Is our biggest disservice to our partner not holding a big vision for them? If our vision for them is smaller than theirs, that’s where we start impeding their growth.

Yes, I never thought of that. We’re in some new ideas here. If your vision of who they are smaller then you’re going to overtly or covertly, subtly or not so subtly manipulate them into smaller.

Without that foundation, without both an inherent understanding of like, “I’m on your team.” I’m still going to have a big vision for you. Without that contract, it feels like things could end quite quickly.

unHidden Conversations: One cannot fix another. Only one can fix themselves.

You dated people in the past. Have you done that to people in the past where you kept them smaller?

It’s usually me, energetically, masculine, pushing, striving, having big dreams. To be completely honest. I’ve been an entrepreneur since I was nineteen years old. I’ve been to New York City alone. I’ve had some blips of success, but I would scare myself out of it. It’s only been in 2016 where I confidently stood in who I am and to be completely transparent. It’s hard, Patrick and me. My partner, Patrick, it’s scary to him. He can blame his sphere on a myriad of things as to why it scares him but once we always get to the root of it, it always comes back be for him too. I’m so afraid that your biggest vision of yourself doesn’t include me.

If we can talk about your relationship for a second. There’s a big challenge in society today as women’s empowerment, as women rise up across the board in all aspects that men feel emasculated to be in a relationship with a powerful woman. Does he have that challenge as well where he feels he’s got to compete with you or does it feel like an issue that you have such a big piece of drive? Does that cause an issue?

To use his words, he says, “I need to like jigger around my role,” because in his mind and what he’s been taught by his previous generations, like the men makes the money and Patrick’s in law school right now. He literally can’t make money right now. Not to say that there’s any cap on what he can achieve later but he feels like he’s sitting waiting in the wings where I’m out living my dreams. We have to constantly retouch base and say, “It’s totally cool to be uncomfortable with this. Our greatest role for one another is to be a supporter even when like somebody else is making money, somebody else feels good, somebody else feels stable.” That’s going to always be shifting and changing.

I felt that between you. I felt both the love and support and the angst around the power. How amazing for a man like him, he’s a good man, for him to expand who he is to be in a relationship. A lot of men are quitting. Men are just like, “I don’t want to be with this. I’m going to go find a broken-winged bird, so I can feel more comfortable.” What amazing man he is.

I love him so much. That was completely out of his comfort zone. That was completely out of my comfort zone and I work in this space. I like this language all the time. For him to say, “I hate this but I will do it. I will try it for you.” That means so much to me and that speaks to the dynamics within an intimate relationship. He’s willing to walk through the discomfort if you know it’s going to ultimately bring you closer. He’s so amazing. Honestly, before I met him, we didn’t have a common language at all. We started from the beginning. “Eating raw nuts and fruits and vegetables, that’s good for you?” That was the first conversation we had. He has just refused to quit. I have so much to learn on his end too, he lives in a very rooted logical space. He’s always pulling me down from floating in the sky and being like, “Come on, let’s root into something here.” You touched on something beautiful, that it’s not a time to quit at all. It’s the time to play bigger because there is so much juicy, delicious stuff on the other side of the discomfort.

What I’m hearing and my extrapolation is, he’s afraid that your vision doesn’t include him but by him not quitting. He’s coming like that’s all you want. Powerful women want men who are not going to quit regardless of their fears, angst, comparisons and history. They just want a man and that’s a rare find in the world today.

I like the distinction. Because in my big vision where I want to go, the partner pillar, that’s humongous for me. I need, I want support. You’re right. I do think I need it. I don’t want to be a floating island by myself, but I can’t put the pressure on my partner to be that pillar. We’ve been taught too as women to never say, “I need you.” That was freeing for me to be able to put a guy on my vision board. I had only business things for so long and then I let myself say, “I do want a partner.” I do want that support because even though I’m smart and I’m talented, I can do whatever I want. It’s cool to have a partner and I know that I’m going to learn so much more with somebody by my side.

I’m a huge fan of want. I hear want in that, I don’t hear the need. You’re a woman with women desires. Women desires, sometimes or most of the time, I don’t know what the ratio is, but includes having a man or a partner. We’re just going to do woman to a man. That’s a wonderful thing to want. You could also want a harem, you could want Lamborghini, you could want massage every week, all those things can be on your vision board but I want Morgan, I want my partner, she kicks my ass and makes me a better man. Every single day I know her and I want that. I love that. At the same time, we often say to each other, it’s like if she found someone better for her or she found a different path. I want for her, what she wants. I know I would continue. My foundation is on self-foundation and self-love and self-empowerment. Morgan is the ice cream to my pineapple crumble. That’s what it is. It’s good for you to want him.

unHidden Conversations: When our vision for our partner is smaller than theirs, we start impeding their growth.

The example that you gave, it answers our original question of do you date someone because you see their potential? Instead, the question is are you committed to seeing the potential in your partner?

Yes. Do you want to tell people how to find out more about your awesomeness?

Come, hang on Facebook. I’m sure I’m tagged right here. Come and hang on Instagram, @ToryDoobs. Rob is on one of my episodes on my podcast. One of the favorite episodes of everybody of all time.

Thank you so much for coming on the show.

Thank you for having me.

—

That was so much fun. I had so much fun during these conversations. They’ll be coming back. They will be a different flavor. I hope you enjoy them. Tune in to Tuff Love. Send it to your friends. Please subscribe if you hear the show. When it turns you on, please subscribe. Please leave me a review on Stitcher, iTunes, Spotify, your favorite podcast app and help spread the word. For more information about myself, my book, my writing, please go to RobertKandell.com and my intimate thoughts end up on Facebook. If you want to see all my personal trials and tribulations. Please visit Facebook.com/RobertKandell. Thank you so much. I love you. Take care. Get some nookie. Bye.

About Gina Hatzis

Gina dreams of a world filled with people living on purpose, shining in their full glory and where busting a random dance move in public becomes socially acceptable.

A recovering journalist, she’s spent the past 20+ years as a corporate speaker and facilitator, woman’s empowerment advocate, Facebook blogger at Project Passion and global host of her show Ignite a Life You Love and her new podcast, Spiritual G Spot.

When she’s not writing, speaking or singing carpool karaoke, she is mothering her amazing 2 preteen kids and desperately trying to convince them she is still dope.

Her first book, working title “Finding My Spiritual G-Spot” is slated for release soon.

About Mary Lou Sandler

Mary Lou Sandler is a photographer, cinematographer, producer, director and owner of3 cubed studios LLC with husband Justin Sandler. Their award winning film, “Welcome to Where You’ve Always Been” (cinematographer/co-director/producer) appeared in 21 festivals in 2016/2017 and is now available on Shorts TV (cable/satellite) and Amazon Prime USA & UK.

Once a working actress, video game stuntwoman, and fitness cover model, her focus now is to inspire and empower women to heal through the arts.

Her commitment to empowering women inspired her to establishFemaleFilmmakers.org (a female filmmaker group to “Empower and Employ Each Other”), and her empathy and infertility moved her to the documentary film“The Empty Womb,” as cinematographer/co-producer. She has also published a photography book called, “The Beard Book,” with proceeds benefiting breast and testicular cancer charities.

About Tory Dube

I’ve done and been all the things. From waitressing in a bikini in Times Square in high heels (ouch), to stand-up comedy, to presenting my services to the NHL, to having my face on a billboard in Madison Square Garden.

In the thick of my eating disorder and anxiety, none of it ever brought me more self esteem. WHAT A CONCEPT! The shit we do does not define our worth, the stuffs on the inside does.

When I finally figured this out and made it my mission of every day, I started to realize the big U is ready to move tectonic plates to bring you what you want. I now live on the sea with my soulman and my puppy, and laugh for a living. I know with every cell of my being that everything else I want is on the way, too. What a way to live, right?

Joy is my spirituality. No need to juice cleanse, meditate for hours a day, or wear a feather earring on my watch. We’ll be digging deep but I promise lots of laughs along the way. Your greatest assignments will be to open yourself to receive loads more joy, intimacy, money, purpose and pleasure. I got you.